What's stealing your downtime? It's you!

For the last 10 weeks, we have taken you on a journey through the 5 factors which prevent burnout. We put them together through undertaking extensive research interviewing and workshopping over 1300 leaders across multiple organizations, and we came up with a simple pneumonic-PACED

So this week, for the last blog of the year, we’re discussing downtime.

Downtime comes in many forms. Working a 4-day, week, actually using your paid vacation time, not working at weekends, or just leaving your phone in the kitchen when you go to bed. ALL are essential to your mental health and performance and too many of us give them away.

When coaching leaders, we frequently discuss the choice that they are making by devaluing their personal time, for work. Over time this creep on your downtime means you are sacrificing friends, partners, hobbies, and fitness/health. We can struggle to see it happening. When you say yes to work, what are you saying no to?

We seem compelled to give away our downtime because of a mix of intrinsic factors such as ambition, super-hero syndrome, or the next bonus. Perhaps it’s down to performance anxiety, a feeling of guilt if others are working, or a desire to prove we’re important or relevant.

It seems simple when we look at it like that right? Work always seems to win.  The reality is though, as much as we might try to convince ourselves and others that we are being productive by dedicating these long hours, we actually aren’t. Countless articles and research papers have shown that working more than 8 hours a day or 60 hours per week actually sees a decline in performance. 

Let’s look at the different “downtime devils” that take you away from your precious downtime and recovery. We’ll also suggest some ideas to help you do something about it.

Are you the always-on leader? You don’t want to switch off because you feel the need to be hyper-responsive and seen to be super-efficient? The opposite is the reality. In studies of leadership competence, leaders working more than 80 hours per week were seen to be less effective than those working 60 hours per week or less, due to a perceived lack of prioritization skills and leadership capability. 

Overworkers are less adept at dealing with ambiguity and taking perspective because they are exhausted and running on fumes all the time. Their teams tended to experience higher levels of burnout too because there are unwritten expectations that if the boss is online, everyone else needed to be which keeps on feeding the machine with even more data points. In short, you aren’t helping anyone. 

The Angel solution - Try setting the example by shutting off emails and phone calls outside of work hours. The more senior you are in an organization, the more impactful this becomes but it works at every level.

Work with your team to ensure they are aware that you are not expecting them to be online or available outside of their normal hours - even if they see things from other people arriving. Slow the tempo. We live in a 24-hour world and people are increasingly working in different timezones. That doesn't mean we all need to work 24 hours a day. Aim to finish your day and finish work at the same time with a delineated transition time - it might be the commute home or it might be closing the laptop to go for a walk.

Are you one of the many leaders who are struggling with being overworked and also clamoring to get out of the weeds and be strategic? The truth is, the more burned out we are, the less able we are to see the difference between the importance of priorities - so we try to deal with all of them. We are simply playing whack-a-mole and never have downtime.  Then we work harder and longer to try and deal with all the things on our plates versus sitting back and working on the most important things. The reality? The only person who can make you more strategic is you - and strategy is about making choices like what to work on, when to work and when to rest.

The Angel solution - In one client project, we encouraged every leader in the program to take a notepad, and pen and go somewhere else, outside of their workspace, to sit alone and think for 45-60 minutes once a week. These were leaders with teams of several thousand staff each, so they were extremely busy people - but they committed to it. This one practice was the single thing in the post-engagement feedback that they attributed to improving their performance, choices, and level of perspective. They created headspace to actually look at the issues versus being immersed in them.

Perhaps you are the leader who starts every day with a bucket of coffee. Or ends every day with a glass (or bottle) of wine to switch off? Or takes sleeping tablets? Or other things? Many people use stimulants to wake up or depressants to wind down because they aren’t creating space for that to happen naturally. Alcohol does help slow the brain down initially but the chemicals in alcohol actually interrupt restorative sleep, are toxic, and are needed in increasing amounts to get the same effect. The biological breakdown products of both caffeine and alcohol increase anxiety and depression and both cause the production of more cortisol, the stress hormone responsible for a host of negative long-term health consequences.

The Angel solution - Start and finish your day with on-ramp activities that allow you to “warm up” your brain and uses natural chemistry versus substances to get you moving. Close out the day with less stressful off ramp activities like admin or that don’t require your full intellect instead of pouring that glass of wine. 

We also encourage people to explore creative downtime habits where you are using a different part of your brain (cooking, painting, jigsaws or suchlike), versus consumptive habits (drinking, drugs, tv) to switch off. It helps to activate the right brain hemisphere and allows the waste products of overthinking and overworking to be flushed out. 

Closely related to the substance user/abuser is the leader who stopped working out, eating well, and parked all their healthy habits. They’ve resorted to cheat meals, and fast-food whilst watching their waistline gradually increase in size. Losing healthy habits also reduces your resilience or ability to bounce back from stress - effectively stealing downtime. 

We are what we eat! The science shows that leaders operating beyond the normal 40-50 hour week are in the stress zone. This makes the body produce hormones that harden arteries, clog veins and increases the chances of cardiovascular issues. Adding saturated fats and processed foods that contain chemicals that inhibit brain function, exacerbates dementia and cognitive decline, and can lead to brain fog. If you’re tempted to use that bar of chocolate to boost your blood sugar, you also get into the realm of glucose crashes which over time can lead to diabetes. 

The Angel solution - Exercise removes these stress hormones, and waste products from the brain and helps you act with more focus. Even a brisk 15-minute walk will clear your head more than a coffee or a chocolate bar. There are plenty of prepared meal/meal box options in just about every country that reads this blog - so look into healthy, yummy options and get that exercise back into the schedule!

Are you the leader who believes only you have the answers or can solve the toughest problems? If so, you’re taking away opportunities for others in your team to develop and shine - meaning you will still be the only person everyone relies on, during your after-hours, weekends, vacations, and time off. 

The Angel solution - Switch your energy to developing high-potential employees to learn how things are done and coach them versus doing it yourself. See the bench strength of your team improve. Remember also that superheroes have to choose who to save - they can’t be everywhere all at once. Focus your energy on prioritizing your skills and talents where ONLY you can be, whilst letting others learn and grow to take care of other things that you can oversee but not necessarily be involved in. 

There is no judgment in any of these downtime devils. The key is to try and make the best use of the downtime opportunities we have coming up over the festive break. There might be one or more devils which affect you more, that you can squish whilst tucking into turkey. The key is how can you continue those habits when you come back in 2023 and block out moments now, to maintain when you return.

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year - filled with more downtime and less burnout!

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